1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a video processing device for producing digest video data, the content of which has been condensed from video data.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, with the growing popularity of video cameras, it has become increasingly more common to take photographs using video cameras. At the same time, there has been greater demand for quickly and easily acquiring content from wide-ranging video data that has been photographed over a long period of time. Techniques have thus been proposed to create digest video data by way of information condensed from video data.
In JP2002-142189A, for example, there is proposed a technology for creating digest video data automatically. According to this prior art, video data is divided into a plurality of scenes, a pre-selected type of evaluation level is calculated for each scene, and digest video data is produced using a predetermined number of scenes from among those with high evaluation levels.
On the other hand, there are also instances in which a user may desire to produce digest video data himself. Thus, there exist applications for assisting the user to create digest video data while actually viewing the video. Such applications are provided with a video playback function, a fast-forward function, and the like, so that the user, while playing back or fast-forwarding, can designate points that he wants to use in the digest video data, to produce the digest video data.
Since digest video data produced automatically does not always reflect the user's choice, applications like those described above are tentatively useful. However, the process of playing back and fast-forwarding while searching for the scenes that one wants to use in digest video data is laborious and time consuming.